Summer Of Developing & Discussing Digital Literacy 2017

Day 1: Update 2 Digital Native vs Immigrant After class introductions, our class dived into discussing Marc Prensky's concept of digital natives and immigrants. Prensky explains that society can be divided into digital natives and digital immigrants. Digital natives are people who were raised in a society in which technology was at the forefront and played a significant role in their lives.  Digital natives can not picture a world or a way of life without phones, internet, and computers. Although there is no specific timeline to divide digital immigrants and natives, Marc Prensky estimates that most people born after 1980 could identify as a digital native. On the other hand digital immigrants have a need to learn how to adapt their lives to incorporate technology as a significant factor in their lives. Below are two videos of Marc Prensky. The first video is him speaking about the concept of digital natives vs immigrants. The second video explains his thoughts on...

Day 1: Introductions My name is Tayla St. Pierre and I am an elementary school teacher at a charter school in Providence, Rhode Island. This summer I am taking a two week intensive course entitled: CURR 550: Digital Media Literacy.  This course is a required course in my TESL master's program. Over the next two weeks, I am excited to discuss how as a country we need to reform education in this country in order to reflect our evolving world. I firmly believe that educators need to change from the current mindset of the purpose of school. Currently, many educators still believe  that the purpose of school is to teach students information. Instead, educators need to realize that students today have access to unlimited quantities of information at their fingertips. There is no longer a need to memorize information, but to teach students the critical thinking and analysis skills in order to consume and produce information that is so easily accessible. I am excited to see w...